As an occasional printer, digital printing (inkjets) has been a blessing to me. I had been using rental darkrooms which caused me to hurry and limit the number of prints made because of the cost of time+prints. Now I probably spend more money on inks and paper but I can limit the number of prints made because I can do all the corrections in Photoshop or Lightroom. The result is much more satisfying. The digital prints are all much better than anything I produced in the darkroom.
I can also make a print at my leisure and not be dependent upon a rental darkroom being available.

This week's column by Ctein Once again I make promises on which I don't deliver. The follow-up to "Complexity and Convergence" that I promised is put off several weeks. Why? Because Mike raised much more interesting and fascinating topics for me to discuss with last weekend's column "Connectedne...

...I miss my camera. Sniff. (However, I have a new rule in place...a camera I try as a rental cannot be purchased until at least a month after I rent it; and, I have to sell one of the cameras I have before I can buy another one. I'm still kind of shaken that I dropped all that money on the D800...

I congratulate you on fulfilling your dream! I'm looking forward to your thoughts and images as you travel.
I had the same itinerant photographer dream. I was always wondering how to find the room for a darkroom in an RV and determined the only method was a custom RV. Of course I couldn't begin to afford such a vehicle at the time. As I near retirement I realize the dream is available because of the digital imaging revolution. Sadly, once again the funds are limited to the point I would have to live in the RV full time. Full time RVing is not out of the question except for the problems of growing old which require regular visits to doctors.

Time Has Changed Me, But Not Entirely I first became serious about photography in 1970, and almost immediately had a fantasy about becoming an itinerant photographer. Walker Evans and the FSA photographers were my heroes. Even into my twenties, I was still holding on to the possibility. T...

Needing a Little Chemical Help No, not "recreational chemicals," but rather darkroom chemicals. When I stopped doing wet darkroom work, I had lots of ingredient chemistry left over from all those years of mixing all my own chemistry from scratch. Most if it I was able to give away to phot...

Our local (PDX) disposal organization has a # you can call about disposal of such items. Some chemicals they are willing to dispose of for free, while others carry a relatively small fee based on quantity. Try googling chemical disposal for your county and see what turns up!

Needing a Little Chemical Help No, not "recreational chemicals," but rather darkroom chemicals. When I stopped doing wet darkroom work, I had lots of ingredient chemistry left over from all those years of mixing all my own chemistry from scratch. Most if it I was able to give away to phot...

I am another owner of the 45-200. I'm pretty happy with it on my E-P1. I have not had a chance to try it on my new OM-D E-M5 yet but I am sure it will be a good performer. I also have the Olympus 150-300mm lens and I'm very impressed with its performance but it needs to be on a tripod, even with the IBIS of the E-M5.

Hope you don't mind a gear related question - I'm fairly certain I've heard you mention that you sometimes shoot in the micro 4/3s format. I'm wondering if you own the Panasonic 45-200mm f/4-5.6 lens, and what you think of it. I've just acquired a 4/3s camera and would like to extend be...

The publisher is just going where the largest market resides at this time. Scott Kelby published some interesting share-of-market numbers a couple of months ago when he started introducing Apps and the Android based tablets were miniscule in numbers compared to iPads. I prefer PDF but old school publishers are just myopic at this time.

Problems of a Closed Universe In our highly technological world, perhaps we are forever condemned to repeat of the VHS/Betamax format wars. The current iteration of this silliness is the competing digital publication formats. More than a technological inconvenience, it can be a barrier that s...

I have been wanting to order a CF tripod but was conflicted over spending the money. As I have aged I have been leaving my heavy Bogen behind. This article just pushed me over the edge and I ordered the GT2531 from B&H (yes, I used your link). I'm looking forward to having a lighter weight tripod.

You'll recall that we previously followed our hero (me) over hill, over dale, and through the woods on a search for the perfectly adequate tripod, in a series of posts called "Tripod Technology." In Part I, back in June of 2010, I profiled my now 32-year-old Gitzo Studex, surely one of the most ...

I'm running 64-bit Windows 7 and have had zero problems. It's running on the best hardware I've ever owned which runs Windows - a MacBook Pro running Boot Camp. I have several Windows-based Adobe programs with plug-ins and Sony Vegas for video editing which I have not wanted to replace with the Mac version.
8GB of memory has been enough for my uses.

I'm contemplating a new PC. Mine's three years old and it's time to upgrade. This always leads to a few questions which I muddle around to try to figure out. I thought I'd ask if anyone can shed any light on this before I jump in and start my own research. Of course, I'm on my computer all day,...

This is Apples way of keeping badly written apps from hurting anything but the apps own documents. It's generally referred to as "sandboxing." Remember when Windows was young and some programs would crash and take your hard disk with it? Well, iOS is still young and Apple is taking no chances. As a SW Engineer it is actually one of the things I appreciate about iOS, they took the time to protect the user from poorly written apps which could brick a phone.
Now, about multiple copies for multiple readers. Most users have settled on one PDF reader for their iPads. Unlike you as a PDF publisher, most users only have one copy of a PDF on their device(s).

And speaking of frustration with the iPad, here is one I simply do not understand. (Keep in mind that I'm a Windows user, so the Apple mindset sometimes simply escapes me.) When I upload a PDF to, say, the GoodReader app, I can't access that PDF file with iBooks, PDF Reader, iReader PDF, etc. I...

Our next print sale is going to be something completely different from the last one. I just don't know exactly what it will be yet. One thing I do know is that I don't want to get into any kind of "rut" with our offerings. If there's any commonality to our offerings so far, the theme has been ...

Ctein, I'm looking forward to your posting!
In my collection the old type R prints have horrible, wildly fluctuating, longevity. In contrast the Cibachrome prints are holding up very nicely. I have every confidence the pigment inkjet prints on rag paper will outlast me by several decades.
Mike, I am really looking forward to receiving my prints!

Aspen in Fog, Boulder Mountain, Utah Charles Cramer—a very modest and very down-to-earth guy, yet supremely skilled and incredibly hardworking—has many connections to Ansel Adams, including the fact that he teaches printing and photography at the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite National Park. ...

Hi Brooks, I thought that as a publisher you might be able to help me understand what the options are for self-publishing a photo book. I have used blurb and I am not at all satisfied with the results. Obviously this is the cheap option, but what is the difference between the way blurb prints ...

Shorpy actually has a usage policy at http://www.shorpy.com/node/8399
Where a policy like this seems to enter a grey area is the definition of non-commercial. If your website which uses a Shorpy image contains advertising are you non-commercial? What about this website which contains a link to "Subscribe to LensWork"? It would probably be safer legally to get the photo directly from the Library of Congress website, if it is available. Disclaimer: I am no lawyer but I sure don't want to have to hire one!

Hello Brooks, First off I must say I am a big fan of your blogs and podcasts. Thank you for providing them. I have to question your use of photos that are not yours. Recently you posted images from Shorpy and another image which looks like it came from eBay (bluetooth transmitter dongle). Aren’t...

I'm a big fan of using Memory Cards and Flash Drives for backup when traveling in addition to the external drive. Flash and Memory Cards can be mailed back from just about anywhere, bypassing the chance of loss due to a transportation mishap whether it be auto or plane.
Once home I have a Drobo for local redundancy and a USB hard drive I keep offsite in a safe-deposit box which contains not only image backups but computer backups.

Speaking of file safety, when I was in Japan and China last year I was concerned about losing my digital files. Actually, somewhat in a panic about it. I could envision my hard drive being stolen from my hotel room, lost in transit, confiscated by customs officials, all sorts of disasters — none...

I'm guessing it is the new, "better", lens correction process which is changing things. Micro 4/3 lenses seem to need a lot of lens correction. It might even be that the conversion is applying the new correction on top of the old correction! Can you turn off the lens correction in LR3 after the Process Version correction to see if it has any effect?

Here is another image comparing Process Version 2003 (the one I did to my satisfaction in LR2, left) to a straight conversion by clicking on the update icon. You probably can't see it at this magnification level, but click on the link below to take a peek at a full size, 100% magnification s...